As a rule, a plurality of different technical devices, which are connected together into a system, interact in modern medical systems. The system may comprise, for example, patient monitors, infusion pumps, anesthesia apparatuses or respirators and/or further medical modules and systems (likewise comprising software systems, such as patient data management systems).
The individual devices and components of the medical system (e.g., patient monitor, infusion pump, anesthesia apparatus and/or respirator, etc.) exchange data via specific communication interfaces. Furthermore, interfaces to external processing systems may be provided, for example, to patient data management systems. It is known that the compatibility of two communication partners is required (is to be ensured). Provisions are made for this that specified test cases are carried out in advance on the respective device to be tested. This has hitherto been carried out manually by a systems engineer, who had to operate the device in question.
However, this procedure has proved to be disadvantageous for various reasons. An enormous amount of maintenance and high costs are associated with it. As soon as a new software update has been installed on one of the devices, it is necessary for regulatory reasons to demonstrate the compatibility in the context of the entire system.
Another difficulty can be seen in the fact that the respective components and devices of different manufacturers are combined into an overall complete (global) medical system. As soon as one of the devices of the overall system has been modified (either by modifying the software, firmware or by other changes), the possibility arises that non-verified device combinations may exist in the overall system. This has to be ruled out with certainty. The previous manual procedure implies the risk that the operator of the system or the client (e.g., the hospital) operates the respective combination of devices without verification and upon their own responsibility. Furthermore, a drawback can be seen in the fact that the respective device manufacturer has no knowledge of the respective device combinations being operated, which may not possibly be verified. The effort needed for testing the entire system rises herewith.
It is known, for example, in the field of mobile wireless devices and client/server systems from U.S. Pat. No. 7,155,639 that a test module can be loaded on the client side even during the operation of a computer system in order to test the functionality of an application interface (application programming interface—API). An additional control channel is installed in this case in addition to the communication channel between server and client in order to make it possible to process and test the data exchange between client and server on the control channel.